"April Fools!" by Pam.

Dedicated to Charon, whose overactive imagination inspired me

 (in between her hangovers of course), lol.=P

As she stormed down the corridor, B'Elanna Torres tried to calm down. She was on her way to the Bridge to deliver an Engineering report to the Captain, but she wasn't sure she could walk onto the Bridge without phasering Tom. 

The day had started alright; Vorik was on sick leave, Neelix was busy in he Messhall (probably making more of that damned Leola root stew, she thought bitterly), and Seven was helping Harry with something in Astrometrics. 

When she'd called for Tom at 0800 hours, she'd found him lying in a heap, blood seeping from a horrible gash on his neck. 

"AAAAAH!" she'd screamed, rushing to his side, her shout echoing down the corridors. She checked for his pulse, and relaxed slightly when she found it. At least he was alive.

  "Torres to Sickbay. Medical emergency in-" Wait! Did Tom just smile? She glanced down at him. He was still. Must've been my imagination, she thought. 

"Lieutenant?" inquired the Doctor over the Comm system.

"Doc, can you beam me and Tom directly to Sickbay. His necks bleeding and he's unconscious."

"Of course, B'Elanna."

She felt a slight tingling sensation as she was transported out of Tom's Quarters. The Doctor was waiting beside a biobed, and when Tom was beamed onto it he ran a medical tricorder over him quickly.

"That's odd," said the Doctor.

"What? What's odd?" asked B'Elanna impatiently.

"Well, according to my tricorder, Mr. Paris is perfectly healthy." B'Elanna's eyebrows rose.

"But..." Suddenly Tom leaped upright, a grin on his face so large B'Elanna thought it'd split his face in two. 

"GOTCHA!!!!" he'd yelled triumphantly, and dropped off the biobed. 

"Why you..." she growled, reaching for his throat. He laughed and ran off down the corridor, shouting "April foooool!" over his shoulder at her. She was left grinding her teeth in the middle of the corridor, her blood boiling.

***

When Kathryn walked out onto the Bridge she came upon a funny sight. After four hours of reading ship's logs, she'd decided to see what her senior officers were up to. Needless to say, what they were up to was not what she'd expected.

Chakotay was kneeling on his chair, turned around so he was facing Op's. Harry was standing by his post, a boyish grin on his face. Most amusing of all, though, was the one and only Tom Paris. The Ensign was perched on the solid beam which separated the upper and lower levels of the Bridge. He swung his legs as he told his tale enthusiastically. 

"And then I jumped up off the biobed, and I shouted "GOTCHA!" and I-" He stopped suddenly as he noticed Kathryn standing just outside her Ready Room with a stern expression on her face. The others noticed too.

Chakotay harrumphed loudly and swung around to sit properly in his chair, avoiding the Captain's deathglare. Harry blushed scarlet, and found something interesting on his console. 

"Mr. Paris," Kathryn said abruptly, "My Ready room, now."

Tom gulped and made his way slowly towards the doors, casting a hopeless glance back at Harry. Harry made a neck-cutting gesture, and Tom gave him a glare that could have turned a warp core to ashes. 

As they entered the Ready Room, Kathryn whirled to face Tom.

"Captain, I-" Tom began, but she cut him off with a wave of her hand.

"Stow it Tom. It looked like you, Harry and Chakotay were having a very interesting gossip session back there. Now," she said, and Tom paled at the look in her eyes, "I wanna hear exactly what happened and to whom, now. Understood?" She smiled sweetly.

***

Tom's jaw dropped. He'd thought he'd be spending a day in the Brig, or worse maybe even be put on Messhall duty with Neelix, but never this.

Trying to get over the initial shock, he started telling Kathryn about his little escapade. She sat down on her couch and reached for a cup of coffee, smiling as she sipped.

When he'd finished, she stood up and chuckled. "Well, it sounds like B'Elanna will be very happy to see you, Tom." He smiled half-heartedly and shuffled his feet.

"Ummmm, well that's about it Captain. Can I go now?"

She patted him on the back. "Of course. Oh and Tom?" He turned from the doors. "I'm human too. Next time, fill me in too, ok?" He nodded, and left.

Just as she was about to start reading reports again, she heard a roar from the Bridge, then screaming. She rose and walked out onto the Bridge, which was in turmoil.

Chakotay and Tuvok were standing back, watching Tom and B'Elanna rolling around on the floor. B'Elanna was shouting a load of Klingon curses as she tried to strangle Tom, who was turning a shade of blue and failing miserably to pry the enraged half-Klingon off him.

"STOP!!" shouted Kathryn. The two Lieutenants rolled off each other and looked abashed as they faced the Captain. 

"I will not have this behavior on my Bridge!," she hissed.

"Does that mean I can kill him when we're off-duty?" asked B'Elanna hopefully. Janeway deathglared her and she turned away. 

"Take your stations!" she gritted.

B'Elanna pouted., Charon-style, before she and Tom took their posts.

Chakotay bent to pick up some pads B'Elanna had dropped, then went o sit down. Suddenly, a horrible noise assaulted him, and the Conn officer's back jerked with s-desperately concealed hilarity.

"What?..." He heard choking from Harry's console, glanced over, and found Kathryn with her head bent over, eyes hidden by one slim hand as she tried not to laugh openly.

"Who?..." His voice trailed off. He tried a laugh, which fell flat, and Paris' shoulder's jerked harder than ever. Trapped, the Indian looked menacingly around the Bridge, but no-one would meet his gaze. He picked up the Whoopie cushion, and placed it out of the way.

"Very amusing, Mr. Paris."

"ME?" the Conn officer wore a wounded look. "ME? Why do *I* always get the blame?"

THE END